Video: Rubble Bucket Challenge - #Gaza 2014

A Palestinian journalist has set a new trend on the internet, 'the Rubble Bucket Challenge' (the Challenge of debris bucket), playing on the popularity of 'Ice Bucket Challenge' (challenge bucket of ice water). - Google Translate

Israeli extremist tries to remove Palestinian flag, gets caught on barbed wire

A settler became tangled in barbed wire after he climbed on to the roof of a Palestinian apartment building in Hebron to remove two Palestinian flags, as seen in a video published on YouTube by B’Tselem.

The incident last Saturday began when a bearded settler, wearing Shabbat clothing – black pants, a white shirt and a large white skullcap – set up a wooden ladder and climbed up it.

He tried to scale a wire fence around the roof of a Palestinian home next to Beit Hadassah, a Jewish apartment complex, in an area of the city under Israeli military control.

Shadi Sidr, one of the Palestinian home owners and a volunteer for the Israeli NGO B’Tselem, filmed the incident. The video opens as the settler, breathless from the climb, gets caught on barbed wire woven into the fence.

Video: Cultural Boycotts - Are They Effective? - BDS South Africa

The Grahamstown National Arts Festival: Africa's largest, longest-running and most recognized cultural event in July 2012 hosted an official discussion on the cultural boycott of Israel.

The discussion was chaired by Think!Fest convener and Associate Professor in Rhodes University's School of Journalism, Anthea Garman.

Panelists consisted of prominent members of the arts community, including celebrated playwright, Mike van Graan; Durban based hip-hop artist and member of the SA Artists Against Apartheid Collective, Iain 'Ewok' Robinson; the editor of The Daily Maverick, Brooks Spector; and others.

The cultural boycott forms part of the larger worldwide boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) against Israel campaign that was launched by Palestinians themselves in 2005 as a creative and non-violent method of placing pressure on Israel to comply with international law and bring about the requirements for a just peace. It is inspired and shaped by the successful boycott of Apartheid South Africa.

By 2035, Jewish population in Israel/Palestine is projected at 46%

A large amount of news, analysis and political rhetoric is disseminated daily about the current American-initiated Israeli-Palestinian peace negotiations. However, comparatively little attention — and, hence, insufficient understanding — is given to a critical aspect of the decades-old conflict: population growth. Differential rates of population growth are redefining the relative demographic standing of Arab-Israelis, Jewish-Israelis and Palestinians in the region, pointing to a challenging demographic future for the Jewish-Israeli majority and affecting key negotiating concerns, positions and strategies, including establishing borders, the status of settlements and the return of Palestinian refugees.

The tract of land at the center of the conflict — the former British Mandate of Palestine – is relatively small. The combined surface area of Israel and the State of Palestine (the Gaza Strip plus the West Bank) is about the size of Haiti and can be fit into Texas about 25 times. The relative proportions of this combined territory are 79 percent Israel and 21 percent Palestine territory (20 percent West Bank and 1 percent Gaza Strip).

The total number of people residing in this tract is also not large. Fewer than 13 million — numerically equivalent to 4 percent of the US population — live there. As is widely acknowledged, the central defining characteristic of this population is its religious affiliation. A brief look at the past provides insight into the demographic status and growth of the major religious groups in this troubled land.

Video: Stone Cold Justice - ABC Four Corners (2014 Documentary)

The Israeli army is both respected and feared as a fighting force. But now the country's military is facing a backlash at home and abroad for its treatment of children in the West Bank, occupied territory.

Coming up, a joint investigation by Four Corners and The Australian newspaper reveals evidence that shows the army is targeting Palestinian boys for arrest and detention. Reporter John Lyons travels to the West Bank to hear the story of children who claim they have been taken into custody, ruthlessly questioned and then allegedly forced to sign confessions before being taken to court for sentencing.

He meets Australian lawyer Gerard Horton, who's trying to help the boys who are arrested, and talks to senior Israeli officials to examine what's driving the army's strategy.

The program focuses on the stories of three boys. In two cases the army came for the children in the middle of the night, before taking them to unknown locations where they are questioned. A mother of one of the boys described the scene:

'Every soldier stood at the door of a room. I was telling him 'What do you want with him?' He said 'Shut up woman.' And then they started hitting him and pulling him out of bed.'

'They started kicking me with their boots in my stomach, slaps on my face. They pulled me up by my t-shirt and took me out of bed.' - Arrested Boy

Israel battles to hold Jerusalem with bulldozers on north, south and east

BATTIR (AFP) 28 Jan — Israel’s separation barrier could soon destroy the livelihoods and redraw the demographics of two Palestinian villages south of Jerusalem, locals say, should an imminent court ruling approve its planned route. The barrier — in parts an eight-meter-high (25-foot) concrete wall — would cut through ancient irrigation systems relied upon by the West Bank village of Battir, separate residents of nearby Beit Jala from their olive groves and divide a local Christian community. The Supreme Court rules on Wednesday whether to approve the defense ministry’s planned route, after a flurry of petitions by locals and activists pleading to redirect it. The ministry insists the barrier, whose construction began in 2002 during the bloody second Palestinian intifada (uprising) and which now snakes some 440 kilometers through the West Bank, is essential for Israeli security.

American PEPs (Progressives except for Palestine) Facilitate Israeli War Crimes

The perennial foreign policy question that is Israel bubbled up for many New Yorkers recently following remarks made by the city’s new mayor, Bill De Blasio, at a meeting of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), the notoriously powerful pro-Israel lobby group.

"City Hall will always be open to AIPAC,” said Mayor De Blasio, in what he thought were private remarks. “When you need me to stand by you, in Washington or anywhere, I will answer the call, and I'll answer it happily, 'cause that's my job."

I appreciate that the job responsibilities of New York City’s mayor are myriad and complex, but blind defense of AIPAC and pro-Israel hardliners shouldn't be among them.

That’s why I added my name—along with 57 other prominent Jewish residents of New York—on an open letter to Mayor De Blasio saying that AIPAC doesn’t speak for me. A new petition started by Jews Say No echoes that sentiment and calls on Mayor De Blasio to reconsider his allegiances in light of the many nuances of the situation in the Middle East.

Why Israel Fears the Boycott

JERUSALEM — IF Secretary of State John Kerry’s attempts to revive talks between Israel and the Palestinian Authority fail because of Israel’s continuing construction of illegal settlements, the Israeli government is likely to face an international boycott “on steroids,” as Mr. Kerry warned last August.

These days, Israel seems as terrified by the “exponential” growth of the Palestinian-led Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (or B.D.S.) movement as it is by Iran’s rising clout in the region. Last June, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu effectively declared B.D.S. a strategic threat. Calling it the “delegitimization” movement, he assigned the overall responsibility for fighting it to his Strategic Affairs Ministry. But B.D.S. doesn’t pose an existential threat to Israel; it poses a serious challenge to Israel’s system of oppression of the Palestinian people, which is the root cause of its growing worldwide isolation.

The Imperator: Sharon’s Catastrophic Legacy

In the middle of the 70s, Ariel Sharon asked me to arrange something for him – a meeting with Yasser Arafat.

A few days before, the Israeli media had discovered that I was in regular contact with the leadership of the PLO, which was listed at the time as a terrorist organization.

I told Sharon that my PLO contacts would probably ask what he intended to propose to the Palestinians. He told me that his plan was to help the Palestinians to overthrow the Jordanian monarchy, and turn Jordan into a Palestinian state, with Arafat as its president.

Dutch largest pension fund PGGM boycotts Israel over Palestinian occupation and illegal settlements

The largest Dutch pension fund company, PGGM, has reportedly chosen to withdraw all its investments from the five largest Israeli banks, whose branches are involved in financing construction in the settlements in the West Bank.

Over the past few months the Dutch pension giant has informed some of Israel's top banks, such as Bank Hapoalim, Bank Leumi, Bank Mizrahi-Tefahot, the First International Bank of Israel and Israel Discount Bank, that their ties with the settlements, and/or companies involved in construction there, were an obstacle from the standpoint of international law, a source told Haaretz.

PGGM's stance is based on an International Court of Justice ruling, which in 2004 concluded that the barrier being built around the West Bank was illegal and should be pulled down, with the "security wall" violating the rights of Palestinians.

Video: Over 30,000 African refugees protest against Israel's policies - Press TV

Tens of thousands of African asylum-seekers in Israel have held their biggest rally yet over Israel's refugee policies.

Police in Tel Aviv said more than 30-thousand asylum seekers attended the rally to denounce Israel's long-term detention of illegal immigrants. The protest is the latest step in a movement by African refugees who protest new Israeli legislation and policies that endorse refugees' long-term detention and deportation. Israel is pursuing this policy despite being a signatory to the 1951 UN Refugee Treaty, which protects them from deportation to countries in which their lives are in danger. Similar protests were held on Saturday.

The Move to Muzzle Franco-African comedian Dieudonné M'Bala M'Bala

French mainstream media and politicians are starting off the New Year with a shared resolution for 2014: permanently muzzle a Franco-African comedian who is getting to be too popular among young people.

In between Christmas and New Year's Eve, no less than the President of the Republic, François Hollande, while visiting Saudi Arabia on (very big) business, said his government must find a way to ban performances by the comedian Dieudonné M'Bala M'Bala, as called for by French Interior Minister, Manuel Valls.

The leader of the conservative opposition party, UMP, Jean-François Copé, immediately chimed in with his "total support" for silencing the unmanageable entertainer.

In the unanimous media chorus, the weekly Nouvel Observateur editorialized that Dieudonné is "already dead", washed up, finished. Editors publicly disputed whether it was a better tactic to try to jail him for "incitement to racial hatred", close his shows on grounds of a potential "threat to public order", or put pressure on municipalities by threatening cultural subsidies with cuts if they allow him to perform.

Video: Within Gaza - Press TV

Human spirit perseveres even in the face of tremendous adversary.
Inside the besieged coastal enclave of Gaza people have to struggle for the very basic daily activities that are generally taken for granted in most other parts of the world. "Within Gaza" series- in 5 episodes- peaks through the walls of occupation and siege to try to reveal how the Gazans go about their lives. Each episode deals with one harshness that afflicts the residents and portrays their ingenuity in coping with Israeli occupation and intermittent onslaught.

Severiano de Heredia, First Black Mayor of Paris and current racial prejudice in the West

After the death of apartheid and that of his killer, Nelson Mandela, racism reborn in West and in Israel!

Today the socio-economic crisis brought down politicians in racial prejudices of another age, vis-à -vis of Blacks. In Italy and France, the Congolese Cécile Kashetu Kyenge, Minister for Integration and her sister Guyana, Minister of Justice, Christiane Taubira-Delannon, have been being treated of macaque and orang-outan. Pure scapegoats of a decadent society that lead to grow up in history, these ladies chosen from the best politicians of the moment. In Switzerland, bananas are thrown to the first Black National Councilor (M.P.) of Angolan origin, Richard Lumengo. In Sweden, they treated Ms. Nyamko Sabuni, of Congolese origin, the first woman Minister for Integration and Equality of genres (2004-2006) of Islamophobic. Mrs. Rotimi Adebari, Irish of Nigerian origin elected in 2007, the mayor of an Irish town of 15,000 inhabitants, which advocates "Respect the difference" is judged by her roots and color. Ms. Manuela Ramin-Osmundsen, of Martinican origin, first Black woman Minister of of family and gender (2007-2008) in Labour Government of Norway lead by Jens Stoltenberg, who suffered serious racist attacks before being pushed to resignation for "loyalty to France ", etc ...

Blood of an Ethiopian Jewish MP refused !

Video: Israel Immunity - Press TV The Debate

The UN is asking for 95 million dollars in food aid for almost a million Gazans, suffering under an Israeli blockade since 2006. Scores of UN projects have been shut down and thousands made jobless since Israel refused to allow in construction material in the besieged Gaza Strip. Palestinians are facing severe electricity shortages and reeling from devastating floods amid the cold winter weather. Meanwhile, the Israeli prime minister has said Tel Aviv will not stop even for a moment settlement construction on occupied Palestinian land despite the fact that U-N Resolution 4-4-6 and a ruling by the International Court of Justice conclude the Israeli settlements violate international law. Is Israel enjoying immunity from prosecution for its violations? On this edition of the Debate, we're discussing how a growing Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions campaign is affecting the global discourse on the Israeli-Palestinian problem.

Video: Israelis forces attack a protest rally by African migrants in Jerusalem al-Quds - Press TV

Israelis forces attack a protest rally by African migrants in Jerusalem al-Quds, violently arresting most of the demonstrators.

Police say they have arrested 180 protesters. Nearly 200 African migrants held a protest march in Jerusalem al-Quds to slam QUOTE the racist policies of Israeli authorities. The demonstrators rallied from the Israeli prime minister's office to the nearby parliament building. They had left an open detention facility in southern Israel. New Israeli regulations allow officials to keep migrants in prisons without trial for one year. Migrant advocates say Tel Aviv is using pressure tactics to force the migrants leave Israel.

Video: The Resources Israel Blockades from Gaza Will Shock You - RT Breaking the Set

Abby Martin speaks with Phyllis Bennis with the Institute for Policy Studies, about the flooding of Gaza, and the effects of the ongoing blockade that has come to characterize the Israeli occupation of Gaza and the West Bank.

Native American and Indigenous Studies joins academic boycott of Israel

Another group of American scholars has joined two other organizations in boycotting Israel's academic institutions.

The Native American and Indigenous Studies Association (NAISA) urges its members to boycott Israeli academia over Tel Aviv's violation of international law and UN resolutions, the NAISA president wrote on the association’s website this week.

Ohio State English Professor Chadwick Allen said the NAISA council has reached a consensus to support the boycott, saying the move followed a member-generated petition asking that the group “formally support the boycott of Israeli academic and cultural Institutions that was initiated by the Palestinian Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel.”

American Studies Association national council endorses academic boycott of Israel

The American Studies Association National Council has called for an academic boycott of Israel.

The council made the unanimous decision after the group’s annual meeting in Washington, D.C., where the academic boycott call was debated. The vast majority of speakers at an ASA forum on the academic boycott resolution were in favor of the call, and now the organization is likely to follow suit. The resolution will now be put up for a full vote by ASA members. Members have until 11:59 pm EST on December 15 to cast their vote. It’s likely to pass given the prevailing sentiment at the conference. However if the majority of voters do not endorse the decision, the ballot explains the Council will “withdraw the resolution and determine next steps.”

“The Council voted for an academic boycott of Israeli institutions as an ethical stance, a form of material and symbolic action. It represents a principle of solidarity with scholars and students deprived of their academic freedom and an aspiration to enlarge that freedom for all, including Palestinians,” a statement on the ASA website reads.

Interview: Randy Short talks Depo-Provera: Sterilizing Minorities? on RT Breaking the Set

Abby Martin talks to Randy Short, President of the Anti Depo-Provera Clergy Coalition, about the dangers associated with administering this form of birth control, and his view that the drug is being used as a form of modern-day eugenics against minority populations.